As soon as Abe had had his supper he went from house to house and asked the men to come to his store for a piece of important business.  When they had come he told them what was in the wind.  Soon after that hour Abe and Philemon Morris, and Alexander Ferguson, and Martin Waddell and Robert Johnson and Joshua Miller and Jack Kelso and Samuel Hill and John McNeil set out for the Traylor cabin.  Doctors Allen and Regnier and James Rutledge and John Cameron and Isaac Gollaher, being older men, were requested to remain in the village and to use their guns, if necessary, to prevent a demonstration there.  Samson greeted the party with a look of surprise.

“Have you come out to hang me?” he asked.

“No just to hang around ye,” said Abe.

“This time it’s a heart warmin’,” Jack Kelso averred.  “We left our wives at home so that we could pay our compliments to Mrs. Traylor without reserve knowing you to be a man above jealousy.”

“It’s what we call a he party on the prairies,” said Ferguson.  “For one thing I wanted to see Abe and the minister have a rassle.”

The Reverend Stephen Nuckles stood in front of the door with Sarah and Harry and the children.  He was a famous wrestler.  Forthwith he playfully jumped into the air clapping his heels together three times before he touched the ground.

“I cain’t rassle like I used to could but I be willin’ to give ye a try, Abe,” said the minister.

“You’d better save your strength for ol’ Satan,” said Abe.

“Go on, Abe,” the others urged.  “Give him a try.”

Abe modestly stepped forward.  In the last year he had grown less inclined to that kind of fun.  The men took hold of each other, collar and elbow.  They parried with their feet for an instant.  Suddenly Abe’s long right leg caught itself behind the left knee of the minister.  It was the hip lock as they called it those days.  Once secured the stronger man was almost sure to prevail and quickly.  The sturdy circuit rider stood against it for a second until Abe sprang his bow.  Then the heels of the former flew upward and his body came down to the grass, back first.

“That ar done popped my wind bag,” said the minister as he got up.

“Call in,” said John McNeil and the others echoed it.

“I call you,” said the minister turning to McNeil.

“McNeil!” the onlookers called.

The stalwart young Irishman stepped forward and said: 

“I don’t mind measuring my length on the grass.”

This he did in less than half a moment.  As the young man rose from the grass he said: 

“I call in Samson Traylot.”

At last the thing which had long been a subject of talk and argument in the stores and houses of New Salem was about to come to pass—­a trial of strength and agility between the two great lions of Sangamon County.  Either of them would have given a month’s work to avoid it.